Calls for Inquiry into Tuam Babies Scandal

RTE News
June 5, 2014

http://www.rte.ie/news/special-reports/2014/0605/621741-tuam-babies/

Almost 800 children died at the Bon Secours-run home

There have been increasing calls for an inquiry into the discovery of an unmarked mass grave at a former Catholic Church-run home in Tuam, Co Galway, where almost 800 children died between 1925 and 1961.

The grave was discovered in the former grounds of one of Ireland's mother-and-baby homes run by the Bon Secours order of nuns.

Researcher Catherine Corless said the bodies were buried in a sewage tank on the grounds.

Ms Corless said public records show that 796 children died at the home before its closure just over 50 years ago.

She told RTE that some of the dead were as young as three months old.

The Adoption Rights Alliance, which campaigns for greater access to adoption records in Ireland, particularly for those born in Catholic-run institutions, said there could be mass graves in other homes.


"This has got to be a national inquiry, it's got to take in all of the mother and baby homes, all of which have mapped children's graveyards on site," the group's co-founder Susan Lohan told RTE.

"We're looking at the very big mother-and-baby homes we know about but there are also smaller ones."

In a synopsis of the research published on her Facebook page, Ms Corless said some mothers who gave birth in the home told her of long unattended labours, mostly without help from a sister or midwife, and that they were examined only once by a doctor when first admitted.

The Bon Secours order which ran the home has not commented.

Archbishop of Dublin Diarmuid Martin was quoted by the Irish Examiner newspaper as saying that work was needed to get an accurate picture of what happened at the homes.

Opposition parties and Government TDs have said an immediate inquiry is required.